Really Good Bars

I grew up in Minnesota. Yup, I'm from the frigid arctic wasteland of... Minneapolis. Actually, it's not as cold as some might think. My family and my in-laws are still there, so we get to visit from time to time.

"Why are you telling me this?" you might ask. I'm telling you this as a way to explain today's post title: "Really Good Bars." Depending on where you live, you would call bars cookies, or treats, or some other ridiculous name. In the North country, we tell it like it is. When it comes out of a rectangular pan, and it's retangular or square in shape, it's a bar. That's just the way it is.
I work with our AWANA kids program at church, and this week we were celebrating everyone's birthday by having everyone bring treats to share. I brought the afore mentioned "Really Good Bars." Here's what I put in 'em.

10 oz. marshmallows
1/4 cup butter
6 cups Cocoa Pebbles
mini M&M's
extra mini marshmallows

Melt the 10 oz. marshmallows and butter. Mix with the cereal in a 9 x 13 pan. Add mini M&M's and extra mini marshmallows and mix. Spread out flat in the pan using a lightly greased baggie. They should look like this:


I must say, they were a hit!

Grilling

Tonight we had stir fry. Although it was very tasty, it was not all that pretty. So, tonight I am going to direct you to my friend's blog. Check out his beautiful grilling pictures. It's easy to eat gluten free when you grill. Yeah for summer!

Salsa Chicken Soup

Tonight we magically changed our Salsa Sour Cream Chicken (from yesterday) into soup!

Actually, there was nothing magical about it; we just added chicken broth, black beans, and corn. It was a great way to stretch two chicken breasts into many meals. We have enough leftover soup for at least lunch tomorrow, if not a few more meals.

Weekly Menu

Here's our menu for this week:

• Sunday lunch - Burgers on the grill
• Sunday dinner - Salsa Chicken
• Monday - Salsa Chicken Soup
• Tuesday - Stir Fry
• Wednesday - Rice Casserole
• Thursday - Chicken on the grill
• Friday - Spaghetti Pie

Thanks to Gluten Free Frugal for the Salsa Chicken recipe! We're excited to try it!

Check out more menu plans here.

Grocery Shopping

Tim and I went grocery shopping tonight. We got food to cover our weekly dinner menu and then a few things we needed for our bag lunches.

We spent about $51.00 at Wal-Mart and about $22.00 at Hy-Vee. That included fixings for S'mores since we're planning on having friends over for a bonfire sometime soon.

Check out this post over at Money Saving Mom for a great deal on organic tomatoes. We got four cans tonight and are planning on stocking up the next few times we go!

Flooding

I know that this is off the topic of eating gluten free on a budget, but I just had to share these photos. I just took them on the north side of town. I thought that the water was just up the foundation of this house a few inches, until I realized that I was looking at the second story of the house! You'll notice the top of the garage door on the left.